Decoding Your Body's Signals (with osteopath Vicky Vlachonis)

0:02When you are pioneering anything or introducing new ideas to the culture, you get criticized. You do? Yeah. Did you hear about that? I didn't find the one. I found someone I respected and we made it the one. In a sort of longing kind of view of love, people understand each other as if by magic. Nothing in itself is addictive on the one hand. On the other hand, everything could be addictive if there's an emptiness in that person that needs to be filled. I now know that nobody changes until they change their energy. And when you change your energy, you change your life. I'm Gwyneth Paltrow. This is the Goop Podcast, bringing together thought leaders, culture changers, creatives, founders, and CEOs, scientists, doctors, healers, and seekers, here to start conversations because simply asking questions and listening has the power to change the way we see the world.

0:58Here we go. Hi, it's Kiki Koroshetz, the VP of content here at Goop. Today, Gwyneth is talking to her longtime friend, Vicky Vaconis. Vicky is an osteopath who for decades has helped people understand the importance of the mind-body connection. She sat down with GP to discuss her holistic approach to treating emotional and physical pain and why she sees pain as a powerful teacher. They also discussed the tenets from Vicky's seminal book, The Body Doesn't Lie, and the tools and practices that Vicky regularly leans on from her Greek heritage. Okay, over to GP and Vicki.

1:38Vicki Vlaconis, welcome to the Goop podcast. Thank you for having me. I'm so thrilled. So I've been your patient for a very long time. We first met when I was pregnant with Apple. So that's 21 years ago. 21 years ago. and you were you've always been such an important part of my healing in the way that I you know you've taught me a lot about the way that I think I relate to my own body and how to listen to my own body when I think about who I was 21 years ago I had really not gone very deep on my wellness journey yet so I've always learned a lot from you and the way that you kind of operate in the world and your holistic approach.

2:29So you're an osteopath. And a lot of people in America don't really know what that means. It's kind of a more of a European term. Can you explain what an osteopath is and what you do? So everybody in Europe has an osteopath. An osteopath practices a holistic approach to healthcare, focusing on preventative care, more like a musculoskeletal specialist. I like to call myself a pain investigator and just kind of take a holistic approach and connect the dots between the physical, the emotional, and the spiritual well-being. Is this something that's been practiced for a long time in Europe? Years and years.

3:16Every primary care physician will work as a team. With an osteopath. With an osteopath, with a gynecologist, we believe in teams of experts getting together to bring the best out and prevent disease discomfort. So what kind of school do you go to for to be an osteopath? So you have to do your bachelor's degree and then you have to get your master's degree in osteopathy. And is that like hands-on mechanical? Yes that's hands-on muscle testing, realigning the spine, listening to the signals the body's giving you and understanding the three-step program, which is part of The Body Doesn't Lie. Your book, which we'll get to.

4:01Is understanding and connecting the dots. Why is this pain good? I say pain is good. Pain is our most powerful teacher and people will come with acute overstrain of their neck or Or, you know, they might have low back pain or had a fall, but we're talking about acute pain because chronic will be more than three months. And so we have to become knowledgeable to understand what is the body trying to teach us. Yes, it might be that you've got neck pain and I need to send you to an endocrinologist. You could be having some thyroid issues or you're low in vitamin D or you're getting headaches. You're clenching your jaw.

4:42You're stressed at work. Or somebody is the pain in the neck in your life. And now there's a signal. The body's trying to tell us that something's not right. Because do we always understand the universal truth about ourselves, do you believe? Somewhere in our body, like in ourselves, we know what's right and what's not right for us? I think we have all the answers. But if we step back and take a holistic approach and be like, okay, how do I feel? How do I eat? How do I move? What's going on into my life now? I remember when I worked at the Royal Ballet School and did the musical theater, Lion King Cats, before you asked me to start traveling the world and moving to L.A.

5:27and introducing me to all your friends. It was like there was a ballerina, there was a moment where she kept falling, injuring herself, spraining her ankle. Boom, yet again, I was like, okay, let's take a step back here. she was feeding herself the wrong food taking lots of ibuprofen didn't have her period for a few months what was her ankle her sprain slowly she started as I put my hands on her ankle she started telling me she was in an unhappy relationship and therefore her body was there the pain was there to wake up the truth you know it's not just looking at that area of the body. It's like looking at the whole body.

6:13I like how you frame that pain is positive, because I think that's particularly difficult for us, you know, especially in an American culture where I think we are brought up to think that, you know, to avoid pain at all costs. And even like in our parenting, you know, we want our kids to avoid pain. I like how you're framing that, that pain is actually good, that it's a wake-up call or it's a call to uncover a truth about yourself or a lie you might be telling yourself or something deeper? Is that something that you, how did you come to understand that? And I'm sure to believe that based on all of your practicing on bodies.

7:00Sometimes I think if we listen to the signals our body's giving us and not go into the mind or the ego, but just listen to the body. There's something called the autonomic nervous system. And we're not equipped to keep going through all these stresses. Yes, we stress, we fall down, we're resilient, we're taught to get up again and fight. But when this stress becomes chronic and you start getting anxiety or shortness of breath and you're stuck, you're feeling lonely and your body's trying to talk to you But you're not reaching out for help. And you're not trying to understand that this nervous system needs to rest and digest.

7:46And so an osteopath, a holistic approach is for somebody to come in and say, let's calm down the nervous system. Let's get you back into the parasympathetic. Let's get you resting, digesting. How are you eating? Are you feeding your emotions? Are you eating foods that are nurturing yourself? Are you sleeping well? Are you exercising? Are you moving your body? Are you talking about your feelings? Let's just take care of you. How did you become an osteopath? Will you tell me a little bit about where you grew up? I think my mother planted that seed of positivity. So back in Greece where I was born, she was a yoga teacher, a Reiki master.

8:25She taught me meditation from the age of nine, I think I was. She would come into my room every night. I was very sporty and she was like, you're going to win this race because you're the best. And I was like, mom, I'm so scared. So literally she planted that seed of positivity. She taught me visualization meditation. Literally, I was closing my eyes, breathing, relaxing before going to bed. I would visualize that I won every game. She would add it with a Greek prayer. So her Greek Orthodox family values of meditation, her, you know, knowledge of yoga, her Greek Orthodox spiritual practice of let's meditate, let's pray, let's stay in the positive, let's get out of fear, go into trust, because if you say it, you believe it, you make it happen, and you manifest it.

9:20Is Greek Orthodox Christian? Yes, we are Christian. Because there's so many, like, superstitious-y kind of great witchy things that seem to come out of Greek Orthodox. Is that just in the culture around the religion? Yes. We wake up. We light a candle. We say thank you to God. We believe there's something bigger than us. We believe in Jesus Christ. Right. But my mom didn't force any religion or us or take us to the church like every week. but she created a practice and becoming an osteopath and traveling the world and seeing all this pain and seeing how people eat and how people move and how their bodies hold into trauma yeah so it could be trauma from the past it could be anxiety it could be a memory because the spinal cord the spine holds the memory of the past so I'm there to uncover the truth yeah and help find the tools to stay in the positive but again I think having a mother taught me prayer these spiritual values these emotional values the mindset lifted me up to to my Greek god I lit a candle I put the incense out there it just changes the energy.

10:46You know you're a better mother when you exercise. You light candles. Everything is so beautiful and peaceful and perfect in your house because you're so present. You eat with your kids. You ask them about their feelings. You cook for your husband. You're home. You're an amazing mom because you also have these, you're dedicated, you're disciplined, but you have these rituals of resilience. Yeah, because, you know, I traverse through really, as all of us human beings do, really, really difficult things, losses, heartbreaks, incredible amounts of stress. And so I have had to cultivate my tools of resilience.

11:29And you talk about these tools of resilience a lot. So can you talk a little bit more about like specifically what they are. So every day I say to myself, I wake up, I take my shot of olive oil, which we'll talk about. I have my water with lemon. I meditate. I pray. If I come home and I'm really stressed, I take an Epsom salt bath. Another thing my mom taught me was dry brushing in front of the mirror. Why in front of the mirror? I know it's this fascinating thing. she'd be like, now dry brush yourself and look into the mirror and say something positive. And I'd be like, oh no. And she'd be like, no.

12:10She'd write little post-its on the mirror like, I love you, Vicky. I love my body. Thank you, body. Thank you, God. And I was like, now I've learned and evolved and realized you have to stay in the positive. No matter what, you have to build resilience and have these tools, the prayer, the meditation, move my body, walk my dog every day, go outside, step on the grass. And we were blessed. I come from Greece, between living in California, being here in the Hamptons, we, you know, we're blessed. We have this amazing weather. There's no excuse. We've got to get out there. We've got to walk, move our body, release, sweat it out.

12:54And everybody has access to nature, to breath, to walking, right, to trying to transform a little bit the way that they talk to themselves or the way that they, you know, hold themselves in their head. I've never been an affirmations person for some reason. I think maybe I should be in the back half of my life. Just when you talk about saying that, it's, it's really inspiring. I know a lot of people really, really do find that it's transformational and that there's something envisioning yourself, you know, in a positive light that you can change the way that you think in your brain, you know, wire yourself to think more positively.

13:39And being a better human being, giving to others, helping others. It's all part of this Mediterranean way of life. Yeah. You know, so you grew up in Greece, very much ensconced in the Mediterranean way. And you, well, before we get to that, because I want to go to your, I want to just finish on your, your Greek Orthodox. I, you know, I'm really either, I think the reason that I'm so fascinated with it is because I always associate a religion with a lot of constraints and and kind of dogma and like you have to do something this way and and I only know about Greek Orthodox through you and there's this incredibly spiritual side and like this direct connection to the divine in a way that it's almost mystical like I haven't seen that a lot in in a religion so does everybody practice Greek Orthodox like in the way that you do?

14:44I think my mom was ahead of the game, right? Doing yoga in Greece. And you know, when I was nine years old and teaching, combining the spiritual practice with the meditation and the prayer was really powerful. It taught me so much that even now, no matter what happens, I'll close my eyes, I might be in the car and take five minutes or, you know, see that white light, shower my whole being with white light and say, thank you, God, I'm here today in Gwyneth Paltrow's house, you know, in the Hamptons. But I'm so grateful and honored that I just, I have this sense of no matter what, I look for the signs and signals like my granny passed away and I see a white butterfly and I'm like, I'm supposed to be here today.

15:32And she's thinking about me. So it's, I think everybody has to try and find a spiritual way of getting out of their ego. And for me, it is my Greek Orthodox tradition, religion, but it's more this visualization meditation, this finding moments to be kind to yourself. And that includes food as well, right? Being mindful. I mean, you do talk to me a lot about the Mediterranean diet and the Mediterranean way. So tell us a little bit about the way that you believe we should be eating. Yeah. So food is medicine. And as Hippocrates said, let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food. I think the Mediterranean diet has been studied for years of millions and millions on millions and millions of people.

16:26And I think just learning from a very young age to love, you know, a handful of berries and some nuts and some beans and some salads and legumes and making it all look beautiful, like having a colorful salad, having a piece of fish or some, you know, roast chicken and sitting together. And it's the Mediterranean way of life is that community where you enjoy a glass of red wine. You enjoy lots of olive oil. You enjoy hanging out with your neighbors. And there's this sense of community where you feel you can go for a walk. That's why people live in the Mediterranean in the blue zones to over 100.

17:10Because we want to live over 100, but healthfully with vitality. We don't just want lifespan. We want health span, right? Yeah. Do you find a difference in people that in your patients in the US than in Europe? The way they eat? The way they eat, their levels of stress, the way that they kind of inhabit their bodies. Because, for example, in the US, we live to work. And people in Europe tend to live to live. They, they, they work because, you know, for all the reasons one has to work, but their focus seems more on the living piece. And so I just wonder if, you know, it's something that's so hard coded into me.

17:57I, and I, I would personally love to adapt to more of that way, you know, as, as I, as I get older to, to slow down and, and not, not, you know, go so hard. And I'm just wondering, like, do you do you see that when you put your hands on somebody in America who's, you know, stressed and stress eating and working too much? Like, is there a difference between or is it all kind of the same in the modern world? No, I think what you're you're saying is, I mean, we love our work. Yeah. Can we call ourselves workaholics? Yes. I think what I've learned more from the European and the Greek way of life is let's take a break.

18:40Yeah. Let's take a nap. People nap. Shops close during the day. I know. People walk more. You know, they'll go. I mean, I walk more. I go for a hike in L.A. Yeah. So I think I've taken the Greekness and brought it to L.A., if that makes sense. But I still keep all those Greek values that I've learned of having a family dinner, sitting down, not eating in front of the television. Yes, this burnout, this constant go, go, go, go, go is a problem. If we can take moments and take breaks and teach our kids these values. Yeah, we're not great at taking breaks and orienting around our own nervous system so much.

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20:11And for our Goop listeners, mention Goop to receive up to$500 off your next meeting or event reservation rental fee. This promotion is valid for all new clients on select spaces booked and actualized prior to December 30th, 2025 and subject to availability. Convene for the moments that move your business. So a few years ago now, you wrote a book called The Body Doesn't Lie, which is a fantastic book that I think if I'm not mistaken, because I asked you way, way back in the day to write a piece on Goop, right? When it was Goop was very, very young about this very idea because you used to talk about it.

20:53The body doesn't lie. The body's trying to express its truth to us through signs and signals and imbalances. And I said, Oh, will you write that for Goop? This is when I, you know, I know I am a Goop success story. This is how it all started. It's amazing. You were in the kitchen. yeah doing my my little newsletter by myself and you're like just write it just write this book just do it and that was yeah that was probably 12 years ago no more 10 years 10 15 years ago probably yeah and yes you were like just put it out there and I think I was on a flight going to Australia and I got an email and they said, we'd love to offer you a book deal.

21:39And I was like, oh my God, GP, you did this. And you do that. You uplift people, you open doors, you help people so much because you receive the love, but you always want to share. And that's the gift that keeps on giving. So maybe you do have a little Greek in you there. And so what is the book about? Because it's still very relevant and a wonderful read. So it's a three-step program, reflect, release, and radiate. So it kind of gives you the tools to become your own pain investigator. Take a moment to step back and look at what's causing pain in your life, physical, emotional, or spiritual. What is my body trying to teach me now?

22:24And a kind of roadmap to how to help listen to yourself and uncover those things. And then find the tools and be disciplined and dedicated to self-care and self-love. Because for you, you did dry brush every night. You started your Epsom salt baths. So all those rituals, you took that and you spread it all over the world. Yeah, that's true. You were probably the first person to teach me about dry brushing. Yeah, thanks to Jenny, my mama. And so is it about giving people the roadmap to discover what tools are best for them? It's basically connecting the dots. Right. And how do we do that? It's also, as an osteopath, you take a full case history to understand.

23:18You were born here. Maybe there was some trauma during birth. Something happened. Everybody has a history. So your story from your childhood, from the first few years you came into this life, how did you breathe? Who was there for you? Were you nurtured? Were you touched? Did you sleep well? So it's really uncovering and shedding because every year as we evolve and we become better mothers, better partners, we learn that we have to shed something that we don't like in our ego. So we've got to go back and honor. I have to let go of this fear or this shame. And where is that stuck in my body? And then honor and forgive these negative patterns.

24:10So you said in America, we're conditioned in a way, but it's kind of like the book guides you to decode. and create a space to forgive. Yeah, that's a big part, isn't it? Because we hold so many judgments against ourselves. And the Greek word for forgiveness, which is sinhoro, it actually means adding space. Sin is add, horos is space. Wow, that's so cool. So you kind of have to let go of that anger and let go of the issues in your tissues, as we say, wherever they're stuck. Maybe it's your lower back pain. Maybe it's a memory from a relationship you had and your nervous system, your body's trying to teach you that, yes, there was trauma.

24:59Yes, it's difficult. We've all gone through pain in our shoulder, pain in our neck, pain from a divorce, a death, a change of home. You know, life is a discovery. Yeah. So if we can turn that pain and find that emotional value, spiritual value, mindset to lift us up, to be grateful there's something bigger than us. Yeah. That shifts the perspective a lot, doesn't it? And sometimes you have to write a forgiveness letter to the person that hurt you. And it could be dear mom or dear dad or dear anger. And just put that away and say, you know what? I'm okay now. I've got to shed this pain that I've been holding on to.

25:44Yeah, because I think it's a wonderful thing that in the last, you know, generation or so, we've been given the language to talk about trauma, to say this did happen to me. But sometimes I'm like, okay, well, now what? You know, it's like, how do we move past something that really hurt or that caused you to create a destructive pattern in your life? Like, I think it is about true letting go and you let go by forgiving either the person doesn't mean you necessarily have to have them in your life. Yeah. But energetically, you let go and and then that can sort of start to impact a pattern that you're stuck in.

26:30Yeah. Yeah. It's hard, but we need patience and time, time to heal. So that's why I believe in meditation, breath work, moving your body. You know, I do the five Tibetan poses that are in there that, again, my mother taught me from a very young age. I have them also on my Instagram. You could do a little video of, you know, those exercises, those five poses. And I know no matter what, if I've woken up and I'm scared or, you know, there's one. I teach these exercises, but more than anything, I think it's having a practice. And, you know, for some people, it's yoga. And for some people, it's Pilates.

27:09And for some people, you have to move your body. You have to sweat it out. You have to eat foods that are going to nurture your heart, your soul. It's a holistic approach. There are no miracles. You have to do the work. You have to move your body. You have to try eating healthy foods. You have to honor the pain. Journal maybe. Write a forgiveness letter. Find a way every day to be kind to your body. Yeah. To let go of your pain. It starts with us. We have to change. Yeah. Yeah. And I think you're right when you say it's hard. It's work, you know, because it is work. It's work to have a practice, to be disciplined around it.

27:52It hurts, you know, if you have unresolved pain and, you know, from a relationship or somebody really let you down, it hurts to go into that place, you know? But I see it with my kids, like, especially when Apple was little and like, oh, don't, let's not think about that. Let's not talk about that. That's like, no, let's, let's, let's feel the hard thing, you know, and, and figure out what is the lesson for me here? You know, what, what could I have done better and differently? I also think victim mentality is, is really, really dangerous. Yeah. And I think when we, if we can step out of fear and step out of our ego and be more grateful and have that spiritual practice where we're lifted up something bigger than us.

28:42And who's really judging? Are we judging ourselves? Who's really judging out there? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of shame. There's a lot of intergenerational family history. But I feel if we have tools of resilience and rituals of resilience and we can find ways to stay in the positive, every day we have to do something for ourselves, at least one hour. So when somebody comes to you with chronic pain that they've had for a long time, how do you start to unwind that? What is your detective process around that? I always think the patient has all the answers they give you or they know what's been going on.

29:31I think it's just layers, peeling the layers to uncover the truth. And sometimes, you know, you just need is timing. Everything's timing in life. And at the right timing, you know, you'll have somebody who's going to ask you the right question. So how do you feel? Are you happy in your marriage? Are you happy in this relationship? Because obviously, as we said, the ballerina, that was the our moment in London where I realized she was unhappy in her relationship. She kept spraining her ankle. She was not eating healthy foods. She was popping these anti-inflammatory pills and not living her truth.

30:12So we don't have to end up in hospital to change. But the ankle was sort of telling her, stop. Stop, listen to the signals and realize you're in an unhappy relationship. You haven't had a period for a few months. You're eating your emotions. You're not sleeping. And now you can't perform. You can't do what's your passion, your purpose is, you know, performing. And when she sorted out the other stuff, did she stop spraining her ankle? She did. She stopped spraining her ankle. she actually broke up with her boyfriend and started listening and started eating healthy foods. And, you know, I sent her to a gynecologist to check that everything's in, you know, with her hormones balanced and just care.

31:03Yeah. Pain is our most powerful teacher. I say pain is good. And it's if you can listen to the signals and dive deep. And as we get older, we evolve and we dive deeper. Yeah. And we're better mothers. Yeah. Hopefully. So let's talk a little bit about, you're not only an osteopath, you're also a founder and an entrepreneur. You have a company called saintsupply.com, where you sell these incredibly high quality olive oils, going back to your Greek roots. Tell me a little bit about the journey. Why did you start this company? And what was it about olive oil? We spent years and years trying to source an organic high phenolic extra virgin olive oil.